ADDICTIONS

Every song has seven notes written over and over again. We find this whole generation hooked to it. We all have mobile phones & keep using it continually to the exclusion of everything else. In fact I have known of friends who simply looked at their mobile phones hoping it will give them solace somehow, as though it will suddenly utter words of comfort or transform itself and give us a hug. I have come to realise that these are much more subtle and difficult addictions to get over.. And so is writing and so is everything that lends pleasure to any of the 5 senses: the eyes, the ear, the nose, the tongue and the skin... And so I, who am an irrevokable addict to the calming feel-good breeze of bangalore, the love of seeing greenery all around me, the love of listening to music, the love of tasting good food, loving the kind tender feel the touchpad of my laptop has on me, the love of writing and expressing myself which leads to further train of thoughts sensually are all Vices I have to be beware of.
Beware of??? Its what I have been doing all my life... You would understand the gravity of my situation if you were as helplessly dependent on any one of these for your day to get along well.. If doing anything else depresses you and drives you to one of these activities...... Say sms-ing in your mobile, switching on the television as a resort to depression.. These are few everyday-life things that we as technocrats are used to but do not understand the grave danger the addiction to these things cause. They all just eat into us and our heads in ways that we cannot understand. It is a virus which does not exhibit any symptoms until the matter becomes very serious.

My father used to tell me a story of one angulimaala (in sanskrit or prakrit this means a person who wore a garland of fingers around him). This angulimaala was a bandit who lived in the forest. He lived by robbing people who entered the forest off whatever possessions they had and then brutally murdering them and then wearing their fingers around him as an honour for having done the heinous act. The Buddha being the fearless and all-embracing soul changes him through an exchange of intellectual dialogues which I have forgotten (forgive the ignorance and the memory failure). After Angulimaala becomes his disciple he comes to the village as all his other disciples and has to live just as they do: by begging for food from the villagers. The villagers livid with anger at his crimes and not ready to forgive him, threw stones at him when he came on his first round for begging. He was severely wounded. Then the Buddha who comes for consolation gathers that Angulimaala has been more injured at his heart than his body. Angulimaala breaks down to the Buddha as the heavy burden of Guilt descends down on him. He explains to the Buddha that he did not bother about how many more physical injuries he sustained but he could not bear the fact that he had committed such heinous crimes and he did not if he was worthy of forgivance at all. The Buddha assures him that much more heinous crimes could be forgiven and all that was required was surrender.

Whats the connection to this and my first paragraph must surely be what you are all wondering. The lesson I gathered from the above story is that crude and simple minds understand through simple words. A murderer who does not understand more than ten words can be brought to the right path by explanation through those ten words. But its difficult to get across to a so-called educated and intellectual mind which knows more than a million words. In other words, these subtle addictions that I talk of: glorification of the 5 senses in anyway is a worse addiction to get over than the murders. Because a thief knows he is wrong but connoisseurs of music who cannot live without listening to music think that they are not wrong. That they are doing the right thing by being addicted to music and even if the Buddha came and told them about it they would probably be very cynical about the advice. They would not heed to him immediately like Angulimaala did. Fancy the Buddha telling a college student proud of being hooked to sms-ing that it is wrong to be addicted so much to a sensual pleasure, he will definitely get a deaf ear. He will also get a few blows if he is lucky. As I hold it, it might take some superman stunts for the Buddha to get across to the present world. The situation is that none of us are looking for a master. We believe we are masters of our own lives. We seem to know where we are to lead ourselves. For example, I would not take one word from my friends to decide which direction I should take my life to (though I seek a lot of reassurances from their side). So whats the point of this excruciating blog?? My point is that we are all addicts in subtle ways we do not recognise. How to recognise if we are drawing the line appropriately?? Keep an alert look out for senses. If they like your present way of life too much then its better you learn to withdraw slowly lest you should become helplessly addicted. Thats what I am going to do.